Motown Savvy

Last week I met the author Alyson Richman on the day her novel, The Secret of Clouds, was launched. She spoke at the JCC in Palm Beach Gardens and is currently on a book tour.

Since no one read the book, she spoke about her background and how she gathers her ideas. The Secret of Clouds is about a the special bond that can develop between and a teacher and a student. At the book talk, Richman related the story of how one third grade teacher has each student write a letter to their eighteen-year-old self and mails it upon graduation. You can hear this inspirational story  here.

Richman also related some facts about her book The Lost Wife, which will made into a movie. Richman overheard the story while at the hairdressers about star-crossed lovers who marry during World War II. They become separated during the Nazi invasion, and they believed their partner was dead.  They see each other again, decades later, at their grandchildren’s wedding. That true, powerful story became the basis of her novel.

I also learned that Richman’s father is an electrical engineer and her mother is an artist. From what I see by glancing through the book, she has the precision of her father and the gift of painting with words– not on a canvas but in a book.

I can’t wait to read The Secret of Clouds and The Lost Wife.

Tags: Alyson Richman, author, star-crossed lovers, students, teachers, The Lost Wife, The Secret of Clouds